European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 6, 1991, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 4 the stars and Stripe wednesday March 6,1991 desert Joseph Owen murky scene that Kuwait the filipino hotel clerk peered uneasily into the murky sky looking for the morning Light thursday morning in Hafar Al Batin saudi Arabia. A a in a staying Here for two years and three months and that a the first time it happens like this a he said. A seven thirty there a something  Daylight still had not arrived an hour later As my companion and i bickered with mechanics to get our four wheel drive Mercedes fixed. Then it began raining Oil. Tiny Black dots peppered my outstretched Palm. It was going to be an interesting Day. Saudi troops at Highway checkpoints had stopped us three times from going to Kuwait where Oil Well fires were spewing out the smoke that deprived us of Daylight. We had considered staying put but on this charcoal morning president Bush announced a tentative cease fire with Iraq. Seeing Kuwait became imperative. Our mechanics lacked a part and the rental Agency had no cars. So we rented the garage owners Al Road vehicle for a sum that seemed greater than Paraguay a Gross National product. We headed North at about 11  the smoke dissipated into a Chalky bleakness As we slithered into a saudi truck Convoy it was Hahng fuel to Kuwait a task that in any other year would be like importing Beer to Germany. A gun wielding Soldier atop a passing jeep waved frantically to get us off the Road waited until he left and got into Tine again the checkpoint was gone. The1 Border station at Ruqio an hour later also was abandoned. The Convoy slipped gingerly across potholes and past the kuwaiti customs House a Jumble of broken Glass and twisted Metal attesting to recent firefights. An opening in the barricade of barbed wire and junk cars ushered us into Western Kuwait. A. A a six weeks of War had turned the expressway into an obstacle course. Charred iraqi military vehicles unevenly filled ditches and bomb damage often forced Drivers to slow Down or to Cross the median and drive on the or orig Side. We passed the faltering Convoy. The debris littering the Roadside could have stocked the world s biggest military surplus store a mile after mile of helmets filthy uniforms boots empty gasoline cans tires Cable spools and other items. Occasionally we saw White and yellow american Aerial bomb casings downed Power lines and dead goats. Defying nature the sky darkened again As we reached Kuwait City at 2 p.m., and rain exploded onto the streets. Flag waving kuwaitis ran madly through them anyway cheering the War s end. A hello hello Quot children shouted thrusting hands into our car. A boo sly great Man a one smiling Man shouted referring to the . President. \ a glance at the City explained their Relief. The War had left them with no Power plumbing or Telephone service. Stores were shuttered or wrecked stripped cars with their wheel rims up on blocks filled ensure Yards. Artillery shells had punched holes in palaces and other landmarks. Daylight faded but a glow from the Distant Oil Well fires turned the Skyline into a Silhouette of boxy shapes against a Dull Orange horizon. Occasional bursts of gunfire echoed through the streets. My companion and i spent two nights in a 14-Story hotel where the elevators did no to work. We had a few Days Worth of food and water and full Reserve cans of gasoline. We lacked a funnel flashlights a two Way radio a first Aid kit and a tool Box. Other reporters arrived with much less. Visiting the marines in Friday. Saw the vast Plain of Oil Well fires in Southern Kuwait. The horizon looked As though the Earth had cracked open with hell poking through. ,. We rolled South toward the coastal saudi town of Khanji. Smoke shrouded the sky and. Dropped the Teni Pesature about 20 degrees fahrenheit. We asked a Marine to drive our car Hack into saudi Arabia so Border guards  Challenge us. As we whisked blithely past the checkpoint i re minded myself that kuwaitis had known Little More than quiet Prosperity until last August. It sickened me to think How easily the rules change How quickly Man a kind turns Paradise into a junkyard Day into  the Gulf death s silence bring Home grim reality by Vince Crawley Middle East Bureau with the 2nd army Cav regt after the firefight pvt. 2 Chaiz Brown was called out onto the Battlefield to help with the iraqi dead and wounded. A a in be never seen anything like this and i Hope i never do again a Brown said into his cassette recorder shouting Over the Roar of the humvee he was driving. A this is really War.�?�. Like some other soldiers he was making a tape of the War for his Mother Back Home. He a 21, comes from St. Joseph Mich and drives for Iron troop from am Borg Germany. Ordinarily Brown Rode in the trailing end of the cavalry troops combat formation More than a mile behind the.1 tanks and Bradley. War was something confusing on the radios a Distant Orange firefight watched and cheered from the roofs of vehicles far behind the front lines. Then it was. Followed by grim Relief when most of the iraqis surrendered and Iron troop found itself swamped with nearly 200 hungry thirsty prisoners. Brown helped search them. But Here on the Battlefield was the other part of War. The part that makes men Gaw quiet. Most of one Many a left leg was missing below the knee and he d been screaming for an hour until a us. Medic found him and shot him up with morphine. Blood had stained the Sand All around where the iraqi armoured personnel Carrier had been blown up. Another Man naked and Black from the fire Lay 20 feet away. His dead body was twisted like someone in those crudely drawn medieval pictures of hell. The Man who was still alive seemed to be dying. Head quit fighting and was growing quieter. Someone spoke arabic and talked to him. Calmer with the morphine he said he was 18. His name oddly enough was Sam. Earlier the arabic speaking g1 said head been asking for his Friend the Black shape nearby. There Are plenty of 18-year-Olds in the . Army but for some reason Sam appeared younger. Possibly because he was so Small As Are Many iraqis. Head said lie Hadnot been Home in 77 Days that too was about How Long the americans had been in the desert. Quot eighteen years old a one of the american soldiers said. A Saddam just done to care a a another sri id in disgust file a just letting Mem Lay Over Here and  / Iron troops medic was sgt. Marvin Evans 37, who a originally from South Carolina hut now Calls Brooklyn n.y., his Home. Most of the people Call him either Doc band Aid the names front line troops use inter or changeable for almost All medics. Evans did no to think the iraqi kid was going to make it. The patient had lost so much blood that his veins had collapsed and the medic  get. An intravenous tube into his . Someone suggested getting a medical evacuation helicopter but Evans predicted that the iraqi would t survive the flight. A a that a just my personal opinion a he said. A i still have to do my  so he worked for about half an hour. Still the iraqi kid stayed alive. The gis carried him into the armoured medical vehicle and began trying to figure out where to take  Battlefield was still in a degree of confusion with prisoners waiting for trucks on one Side and men blowing up empty enemy vehicles out in the Middle. It had been a Germany kind of Day with heavy Clouds and darkness fell before the soldiers in Iron troop could finish refuelling and arranging themselves Back in combat formations. Later it began to  still the iraqi kid stayed alive. He kept Drifting in and out but Evans was growing More determined. The iraqi wanted to live bad enough that Evans was beginning to change his mind about his first  somebody told him that medical evacuation helicopters  Fly this close to the front so he drove to the South looking for somewhere to take his enemy patient ,. It began raining harder. Blow in the humvee Driver and a couple of the others Pul on their raincoats and stood around talking. It was so dark now that you  see a person from 10 feet away. Brown talked about the enemy kid who refused to die and wondered if the iraqi would make it. A when my time comes a one of the others Saida a that a the Way in a Gonna be. I wont die. Ill hang  the night before under a clearer sky Brown had watched the regiments first firefight from a great distance. Down in a Valley lightning troop had been exchanging fire with remnants of iraqis 48th div. A a a when i was joining a Brown had said a my Recruiter 7 said that if i wanted to really spend ,20 years in the army my chances of not seeing combat Are about the same As winning the  in fact Brown had been playing the lottery then winning nothing a and its True Quot he went on. Quot Twenty years ago my dad was in Vietnam. Twenty years before that my Grandfather was in world War ii. That a just the Way it  eventually the medical vehicle returned. A Sam s doing of a Evans said. A the was still talking. The most important Point was. He did no to give  in the 2 . Darkness in a thunderstorm and artillery barrage another firefight broke out. This time it was the iraqi 12th army div tangling with Iron troop tracers flew and Bradley fired up the night. More prisoners were captured and Evans went out onto another Battlefield with More dead on it. War remains for iraqi troops that were Cut off by last week s sweeping movement by coalition troops Retreat was the primary objective and i talc else mattered a As is evident by this Battleground scene. When one iraqi his copy of the Muslim Koran and helmet Hind on the Highway outside Kuwait City. Soldier fled were left be